Buddy O’Connor – The Rangers’ First Hart Trophy Winner

When the Rangers acquired Herbert “Buddy” O’Connor as part of a five-player trade with the Montreal Canadiens on August 19, 1947, the team hoped that the veteran center would help the Blueshirts improve and advance to the Stanley Cup Playoffs in 1947-48.

The deal proved to be one of the most successful trades in franchise history. Plus, O’Connor’s indispensable value to the Rangers’ fortunes was instantaneous.

A Montreal native, Buddy played his entire junior and minor league career in his hometown with the Montreal Royals, a Canadiens farm team. In 1941-42, at the age of 25, O’Connor made it to the Canadiens roster and was a finalist for the Calder Trophy as the NHL’s Rookie of the Year, finishing second in voting to the Rangers’ forward Grant Warwick. The following season, he was runner-up for the Lady Byng Trophy – awarded to “the player adjudged to have exhibited the best type of sportsmanship and gentlemanly conduct combined with a high standard of playing ability” – as he registered 58 points and only took one penalty in 50 games during the season.

Over six seasons with Montreal, O’Connor helped the Canadiens win two Stanley Cups and finish the regular season in first place in each of his final four campaigns. After averaging just more than a point per game over his first four seasons with the Canadiens, O’Connor’s offensive production dipped, and his contributions were overshadowed by Montreal’s legendary “Punch Line” of Toe Blake, Elmer Lach, and Maurice Richard.

While the Canadiens’ 1946-47 season ended with a loss in the Stanley Cup Final to the Toronto Maple Leafs, the Rangers were aiming to get back into the playoffs for the first time since 1942. After finishing the 1941-42 season with the NHL’s best record, the team’s roster was depleted during World War II. Frank Boucher, the Rangers’ General Manager and Head Coach, began to rebuild the organization’s farm system during the mid-1940s, but he realized that for the Blueshirts to make the playoffs in 1947-48, he would have to add veteran players via a trade.

The deal that Boucher worked out with Canadiens General Manager Frank Selke, Sr. was to acquire O’Connor and defenseman Frank Eddolls – Boucher called him the “best defenseman not playing in the National Hockey League” at the time – in exchange for three of the Rangers’ young players – defenseman Hal Laycoe, and forwards Joe Bell and George Robertson.

Boucher felt that the Rangers would not only make the playoffs as a result of the trade, he also felt that the Canadiens – even though they had finished with the NHL’s top record in four consecutive seasons – would miss the playoffs. Prior to the start of the 1947-48 season, Boucher predicted that the standings for the six-team NHL would end in the following order: 1. Toronto; 2. Detroit; 3. Boston; 4. Rangers; 5. Montreal; 6. Chicago.

The prediction was amazingly accurate.

The Rangers began the 1947-48 regular season with a game against the Canadiens in Montreal, and O’Connor received a prolonged standing ovation in his return to the Forum. The Blueshirts won the game, 2-1, beginning a successful campaign – both for the team in general and specifically against the Canadiens.

O’Connor didn’t record a point in the season opener against the Canadiens, or in each of the Rangers’ next two games. But over the course of the 60-game season, he would ultimately tally at least one point in 43 different contests. Listed at 5’7” and 142 pounds – he was the lightest player in the NHL in 1947-48 – O’Connor’s exceptional speed and crafty stickhandling and playmaking ability enabled him to have success. And in 1947-48, out of the shadow of the “Punch Line” in Montreal, he came into his own.

O’Connor scored a goal in each of his first three games at MSG with the Blueshirts, including a hat trick on November 2, 1947 to lead the Rangers to a 7-4 win over the Maple Leafs. On November 22, 1947, he scored the go-ahead goal on the power play in the third period during a game against the Canadiens in Montreal – earning an ovation from the fans – and the Rangers ultimately won the contest, 5-3.

The Blueshirts earned a point in each of their first five games against Montreal in 1947-48, winning four of those contests. In a 4-2 win over the Canadiens on December 11, 1947 in Montreal, O’Connor tallied three assists – all primary assists – while helping longtime Rangers forward – and Montreal native – Phil Watson record a hat trick.

From the middle of December until the end of the regular season, O’Connor didn’t have two consecutive games without registering at least one point. During one stretch of the season, he tallied at least one point in 16 games over a 17-game span, and by January 1, 1948, he was leading the NHL in scoring.

O’Connor held the NHL scoring lead until the final weekend of the regular season, when Lach tallied five points in two games to pass him. The Rangers center finished the 1947-48 campaign with 60 points – 24 goals, 36 assists – in 60 games, trailing Lach by just one point for the Art Ross Trophy. The Rangers, however, finished four points ahead of the Canadiens in the standings – thanks in large part to a 7-3-2 record against Montreal – and made the playoffs, edging out Montreal in the process. Boucher’s prediction for what the NHL standings would be at the end of the season was 100% accurate.

The Rangers faced the Red Wings in the playoff Semifinals. Although Detroit earned 17 more points than the Blueshirts during the regular season, the Rangers battled the Red Wings through a physical six-game series hampered by the loss of key defensemen. Without Eddolls, Bill Moe, and ultimately, captain Neil Colville – who was injured in Game 6 – the Rangers lost to the Red Wings, but the defeat did not dampen the overall feeling about the team’s solid season.

Nor did it diminish O’Connor’s extraordinary campaign. Although he failed to win the scoring title, he was named winner of the Hart Trophy as the NHL’s Most Valuable Player, becoming the first Ranger in franchise history to win the award. With only eight penalty minutes in addition to his 60 points during the season, O’Connor was also selected as the winner of the Lady Byng Trophy.

A Rangers player had won the Lady Byng Trophy several times before – Boucher was the recipient so frequently (seven times in an eight-season span) that he received the original trophy from Lady Byng and a new one was created for future winners – but there had never been an NHL player who won the Hart Trophy and Lady Byng Trophy in the same season. O’Connor had made hockey history.

The Rangers hoped to build on their success from 1947-48, but their 1948-49 season was derailed before the team took the ice for their first regular season game. While the team was training in Lake Placid, four players – O’Connor, Laprade, Eddolls, and Moe – suffered injuries in a car accident. All four players were hospitalized for injuries; while Laprade and Moe were discharged after just a few days, O’Connor was hospitalized until October 19, while Eddolls’ hospital stay was even longer.

O’Connor and Eddolls had the most significant injuries from the accident; several of O’Connor’s ribs were broken and Eddolls severed a tendon in his leg, and the injuries to two of the key players who helped the Rangers make the playoffs the prior year kept them on the shelf to begin the 1948-49 season.

The Rangers center ultimately missed the first 14 games of the season, and the team only won three of the 14 contests. Although O’Connor led the Blueshirts with 35 points in 46 games in 1948-49 (and was not assessed a penalty during the year), the team did not advance to the playoffs.

In 1949-50, however, the Rangers returned to the playoffs. With O’Connor as the Blueshirts captain and elder statesman at 33 years old, he tallied 33 points in 66 games. In the playoffs, he helped the Rangers defeat the Canadiens in five games in the Semifinals and advance to Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final, before the Rangers were defeated by the Red Wings in double overtime. O’Connor played one more season with the Rangers in 1950-51, finishing his four-season tenure as a member of the Blueshirts with 164 points and only 12 penalty minutes in 238 games.

One of the most skilled and gentlemanly players of his era, O’Connor was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1988, and he will forever hold the distinction of being the first Ranger to win the Hart Trophy as NHL MVP, as well as the first NHL player to win the Hart Trophy and Lady Byng Trophy in the same season.